


friendsgiving

by xether



Category: Red Velvet (K-pop Band)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-29
Updated: 2021-01-14
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:33:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 1,772
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27773842
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xether/pseuds/xether
Summary: some white lies and a time killer only pull them closer together.
Relationships: Park Sooyoung | Joy/Son Seungwan | Wendy
Comments: 1
Kudos: 23
Collections: wenjoy crumbs





	1. thanks

"truth." joy smirks as their gathering erupts into oohs and ahs. they sit, nearly cooking, in irene's hot tub. would they rather freeze in the cold of november? no. "the juxtaposition of the extreme temperatures is comforting" as yeri said was… an interesting take, but not exactly true. the temperature difference would probably give them pneumonia or something. wendy's not really concerned with that. 

her shoulders are cold. and she can't imagine how cold joy's upper torso must be. she remembers that she had better stop staring at joy's blue lips a little late. eyes flicking up to joy's, wendy watches as joy smirks. joy's eyes lazily trace an arc from wendy's face to seulgi's. 

"well?" 

"who's your favorite best friend?" seulgi asks with a big smile. everyone else pretends not to notice her fingers laced between irene's under the surface of the bubbling water. joy eyes their hands, and looks at wendy for a moment before settling on,

"you, seulgi-bear." the tension between the five of them dissolves, and maybe that was the right answer. so what if it's a little lie, they all know it. the truth is right there in front of them. if joy had said the truth? who knows what would've gone down next. it's different when the truth comes out and they're skin on skin sharing the last of the four built in hot tub seating spots. 

but seulgi celebrates with an arm in the air and a quick "eat it, yerim!" 

"are you cold?"

"no." wendy lies straight through her chattering teeth and purple lips. joy floats out of her place, telling yeri to turn the temperature up 2 degrees higher before being told to do it herself. then she returns to wendy's side.

"right. neither am i." she slouches into the water, submerging everything except her head which she leaves on wendy's shoulder. 

wendy dove too deep with this one, didn't she? this girl is never letting wendy climb out of these deep blue pools of smooth skinned hugs and brown eyed longing. but it'd be a lie for wendy to say she didn't like it. 

she didn't mind the water. she liked wading sooyoung's water.


	2. love

does she want more than this? it's a tough question to answer. just over 2 months had passed since she caught wendy staring as she closed the bathroom door in nothing but a towel, about to wash the hot tub chemicals away. she didn't say anything. the red in wendy's cheeks was embarrassment enough. joy knew when not to pry.

she's scared. she thinks -knows- wendy feels the same way. but she always denies it. yeri asks about what looks like two mutual crushes and joy hides behind "we just have soft spots for each other." 

what happens when they finally succumb to it? to the longing. when they finally tell each other what they want, how they feel.

joy doesn't want this to change. if she could have wendy forever, with this unspoken mutual pining, she would. but wendy won't wait forever. wendy shouldn't wait forever. wendy doesn't owe joy any unspoken relationship. she deserves clear communication. an unadulterated "i want you." 

some of the fear comes from wendy liking her so intensely and obviously. what happens when she finally says it? does the adorable embarrassment over staring for too long stop? does the hesitance stop? she likes that about wendy. what if all the best things stop? what if wendy stops?

stops liking her.

joy shivers at the thought. does she wait for that? let this stupid little thing go away. or does she move before that? take what she can get and deal with the ache later.

"are you cold?" wendy pulls her out of those pink-induced valentine's day thoughts. the remnants of breath swirl around the cold dry air in front of her. 

"a little." joy holds out her hand, as she usually does. wendy doesn't take it. instead, she slips hand warmers into joy's pocket. 

"they're reusable!" she smiles and starts off to meet the others who are already holding ice skates, a galentine's day tradition of theirs. 

joy freezes. her heart sinks. it's already happening. she's losing her catch. the line is broken.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :) I hate school


	3. birthday

"thanks," wendy repeats over and over as people yell out greetings in the halls. she's not having the best day. she got a c on her physics test earlier that morning. it was the average, but she doesn't just do average. she got the wrong boba order too. 

but above all that, sooyoung hadn't greeted her for her birthday. the three others called her simultaneously at midnight. she answered none of them. then she threw them all into a group facetime so she wouldn't have to pick who was her favorite.

because her favorite didn't call her. she would've picked up joy's call first, if she had gotten it. 

"she probably fell asleep," irene said just before leaving the call. she was the last one left when yeri and seulgi decided it was time to hit the hay. "she wouldn't forget. especially not you."

wendy had hoped so. but now she's climbing up the stairs to her room after flunking a test in a class she has with joy, who was probably preoccupying her during the stupid electricity test anyway. she had postponed the student council meeting. the others told her to take it easy on her birthday. 

she opens the door to joy hanging lights and sheer curtains on her canopy bed frame. joy has headphones on. hopping off the bed, she checks the clock when she sees wendy quietly putting her back down. 

"you're early!" she pushes wendy back out the door, and the lock clicks as wendy blinks in shock. 

their hearts race as they stand on opposite sides of the door. 

joy holds one hand on the handle, the other against the door. wendy presses her ear up against the door and hears joy breathing fast and hard. and loud. she smiles to herself

"why are you home early?" joy bites her lip and screws her eyes shut as she tries to come up with an excuse. she's stuck. there's very few excuses available. what else can she say other than "i felt like pampering you." she had better just shut up.

"i wasn't having a good day." wendy admits. joy curses herself. she didn't even notice. maybe she would've known that wendy was going to come home early. 

"i'm sorry. can i just finish up? i'll let you in. promise. then you can talk about it. you'll have me all you want." almost too aggressively, joy tears her headphones off, throwing them onto the bed. she has to make this quick. she was going to cook up some popcorn and arrange some snacks onto a tray and pull out some romantic red velvet valentine's day sheets she bought just for this. those are going to have to wait. she'll finish the lights, turn on the movie, and pray to whichever god listens that wendy likes it.

"sure." wendy hums. joy hears wendy's back slide down against the door.

then a few minutes of faint thuds, presumably from joy jumping on and off wendy's bed. the tv turns on, and wendy hears the trailer to some random show lower in volume. 

"okay." joy opens the door, and wendy scrambles to stand up. "happy birthday, seungwan." between labored breaths, joy throws her arms out in a sort of brava gesture. she wipes the sweat off her brow with her shirt as she watches for wendy's reaction. 

"you're the best," wendy whispers as she eyes the dimmed lamps and the golden lights. she reaches for joy's hand. "lay down with me?" 

she feels all the day's worth of troubles dissolve when joy wraps her arms around her as they settle onto the bed. wendy's body nests against joy's. the remote in joy's hands lays in wendy's lap too. joy tucks her chin onto wendy's shoulder, and wendy really isn't paying attention anymore.

was all of this just an elaborate birthday scheme? could she dare to interpret this as something more? is this still friendly? sneaking into someone's room without anyone but their family knowing wasn't just friends, was it? 

"what was it?"


	4. change

"what do you mean?" wendy knows her heart is racing under joy's arm. she didn't expect joy to ask a question that lines up so well with what she is thinking. 

"the thing about your day? and do you want anything from me for your birthday?" 

"oh. it's nothing. this is all plenty." joy squeezes a little, shimmying her arms somehow even closer to something that looked impossibly intimate. she settles her chin on back onto wendy's shoulder and huffs.

"i don't think so, but if you say so. just tell me whatever you want. i'll do it." there's a moment where nothing happens. the show falls quiet. they fall quiet. just before wendy's phone buzzes and the show dialogue resumes. 

she doesn't answer it. it's probably her grandma wishing her happy birthday, so she should. but she doesn't. doesn't even look at it because she has other questions. something more urgent. something more dire. 

"do you want me to be your girlfriend?" it's mumbled. barely escapes the shackles of wendy's self-restraint. she half hopes joy didn't hear it over the ghosts haunting the little pair of twins on her tv. 

she knows what she wants. she wants joy to be her girlfriend. that's for sure. ask the questions she doesn't know the answer to. 

joy shifts. she clears her voice, and wendy needs her to speak faster. answer faster. say something before wendy combusts. there's an uncomfortable warmth blossoming in the pit of her stomach. she needs joy to wash it out already, to do something. 

"i asked what you wanted," her arm drops from above wendy's waist. she fidgets with the remote, and she sounds small. so small. scared. just as scared of an answer as wendy was. "but is it okay that i do?"

wendy brings her hand up to joy's cheek, pushing joy's face closer to hers. she turns her face, nose buried against joy's cheek bone. "yeah." mumbling against joy's cheek, she presses a kiss just beside joy's lips. "of course it's okay."

and the wave crashes over. the fire in her is out. her head is above water. above sooyoung's water. she can finally breathe again. and she breathes in the cool, refreshing ocean breeze. 

and a little bit of joy.

"you're kinda sweaty."

"i was working hard for you, and you made me nervous!"

“i know. thank you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i feel like my writing style is so dynamic that it doesn't flow together anymore :| whatever! happy new year everyone.

**Author's Note:**

> was yearning at 4 am on thanksgiving... missed a few different friends. some memories.


End file.
